Yeah for Grandma Judy!

Big shout out to Gus, our long-lost travel companion. He inspired us with a psuedo-mandatory happy hour, strong coffee, and nonstop teasing of Elizabeth. This photo was taken in Shelby, Montana, as he headed back to the real world. Smell you later, G-dawg.

BTW,
Yeah for Grandma Judy!

We are now kickin' it in Grand Forks, ND with Mark's grandmother. Quite possibly the coolest grandma ever (of course next to our own wonderful respective grandmothers (of course)).

The past four days have been filled with very moody riding. The first two with 30 mph headwinds, rain, and cold. The following two days changed to the polar opposite and brought us the absolute elation(!) of sunshine and a breeze from the rear (especially after a half-gallon of milk, twice daily, and Elizabeth's lactose intolerance...).

As we pulled out from Minot and hopped onto good ol' highway 2, we stumbled upon this sign to a fishing access. It was somewhere inbetween miserable and middle of nowhere -- good luck finding this one on the map. We had no idea that Bjorn Berg, another St. Olaf mathematics buddy, could have such power over the US Fish and Wildlife Dept... We shoved into the wind for close to seven hours, covering a miserable 69 miles. The wind never ceased, the clouds never broke, and all four of us started thinking of the thousand other things we would have rather been doing... This day of bliss was a Saturday, which really doesn't matter all that much except for the fact that we had a package to pick up, General Delivery, in Rugby, ND. Good thing the wind was blowing and the office closed at 2:30 pm. We called ahead to let them know we would be late, perhaps a half an hour late or so. We pulled in three hours late and in the small town of 872, Kelly rode right past the head pastmaster at a garage sale on main street. What luck, huh? Yup.

Some small towns claim odd bits of fame such as "World's largest string ball" or "North America's biggest fiberglass cow" etc. Well Rugby is the fortunate town of North America to be blessed with the "Geological Center of North America" award.

The next day of amazingly inspirational (!) head-wind led us to a small town named Minnewauken, on the SW corner of Devil's Lake. Both of those days we averaged 10.9 mph. Slowpokey. The oddest thing about the ride that day was the crossing of Devil's Lake. Turns out that the folk of ND don't like to bother with any of that "put a road around the lake" nonsense. Nope. Just plow right through the whole pond and stick a road where ever it needs to go. Same goes for the railroad too, by gosh. And so we pedaled right through the lake, a lake some twenty miles across, on a two lane highway with a two foot shoulder, a few rocks, and then water.

The small towns of North Dakota have kept us all very intrigued as to how well they are all maintained. Every town, even the ones of some 300 people are in prestine condition with at least five or six victorian style homes and emaculate yards. Two days ago, as we pulled out from Minnewauken (which is Mandan for "spirit water") the sun was shining, the clouds few and far between, and thanks be to God, not a lick of wind. We worked it all the way to Lakota for a gigantic lunch (one load of bread, one pound of ham, 1/2 lb cheese, a rather large bag of potato chips, 1/2 gallon chocolate milk, four tomatoes, two avocados, and two lbs. of grapes) and a short nap. We then decided to ride down the road another ten miles to camp in Michigan. Such a bad idea. It was hard to breath we were so full.

Earlier that morning, while we were outside of WalMart, (we definitely bought two lbs. of "fun size" candy) Elizabeth found $20 under a bush. While some would say, "great! we just paid off part of our hotel expenses!" Liz promptly looked up and asked, "G&Ts for dinner tonight, guys?" Yes, G&Ts, indeed.

After a great stay in Michigan, ND, we shoved off for our final push to Grandma's. Fourth floor of the Columbia Park Towers never looked so good... We arrived only moments before the bronze 1993 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme slid into the parking lot. She was happier than a pig in mud to see us and insisted that our bicycles take over both the two indoor parking slots she had reserved especially for her "grandson and his friends."

As we walked into the condo we noticed a fully set dinner table. With a cake! Yeah for Grandma Judy. The past two days go into the category of "super sweet quality time" with Grandma. Last night we all went to Al's Dinner to fulfill our 4:45 pm dinner reservation and then off to see "A Prairie Home Companion" at the movie theater. We have been contuously fed to darn near the point of explosion. And it all tasted so good...

Today has been a good day of rest -- and lots of food. Good thing we are all wearing spandex and not clothing that actually is supposed to fit ('cause it won't!). Tomorrow we plan on riding to the head waters of the Mississippi, Lake Itasca, and then off to Lake Superior's North Shore. We hope to land in the Twin Cities by the 27th-ish-of-June-ish (stress the -ish part).

That's all for now -- we hope y'all are enjoying reading along as much as we are enjoying riding along.

Until next time,

Kelly, Caleb, Mark, and Elizabeth & Grandma Judy in Grand Forks, ND

PS: New pictures are up. Keep those comments coming!